Musa gives Taiwan full support

Taiwanese Vice President Annette Lu and her hundred strong delegation left Belize this morning, but not before making it clear that relations between her new government and Belize are, if anything, even stronger than in the past. In a press conference held Thursday night Prime Minister Said Musa made his clearest commitment to date that Belize was firmly in Taiwan’s corner.

Prime Minister Said Musa

“We are very pleased with the relationship between Taiwan and Belize. We look to Taiwan as a country that has proven itself from a, if you like backward agricultural economy of the last 40 years, that today is a giant, not only in Asia, but indeed in the world in terms of economic development. But Taiwan has also proven that with hard work, with discipline, with the right educational skills, a country can be transformed in a very short period of time. And we believe that the 23 million people of the Republic of China on Taiwan, have every right to self-determination, just as the Belizean people exercise their right to self-determination. And this is why we give unstinting and unhesitating support to the Republic of China on Taiwan for membership in the United Nations and indeed to other international organisations.”

Vice President Lu echoed Musa’s sentiments and told News Five that she expects that Belize will lobby on Taiwan’s behalf, particularly in CARICOM, where Taiwan is recognized by only a small handful of nations. On the local level Lu noted that Taiwanese living in Belize have expressed concern over the problem of rising crime… and promised that she would examine the possibility of providing assistance to Belize’s police department. Later in this newscast we will run excerpts from an interview conducted with Vice President Lu.

Viewers please note: This Internet newscast is a verbatim transcript of our evening television newscast. Where speakers use Kriol, we attempt to faithfully reproduce the quotes using a standard spelling system.